Memories
by To.Be.Indeed
Summary: A killer seeks revenge, a murderous puppeteer lies in wait, and the Gaang is caught in the middle of it. More painful than his actions will be the memories. Embark on this journey of action, betrayal, and love at your own risk.


A/N: Quick facts about this fic --

First off, this _is _tragedy, but it's not angst for a reason. It's only marked tragedy for how it ends. It has a _lot_ of Oc's, and the Gaang doesn't get a lot of spotlight in the first three or so chapters, but after that, they'll be just as important as the OC's. I'm not sure what a Mary Sue or Gary Stu is _persay_, but I don't think that my OC's are. There is very little shipping in this, though where it is, it's angsty and it severely affects the plot. There is also a lot of death, I won't say who it is yet though. I'm trying to keep it below M, but if you think I should step it up, do tell me. I don't want to get in trouble or anything. Finally, the first few chapters are not nearly as good as the later ones will be. I've had most of _those_ scenes worked out for months, but these I may have come up with as soon as last week. Bear with the beginning, if you will.

* * *

Rolling clouds of bitter dust exploded from the sides of an enormous mechanical drill as it slinked onward, its sights set on an unsuspecting populous of Earth Nations citizens. Sixteen Fire battalion tanks flanked the monster in a large 'V' formation, each one driving furiously ahead to take the last impenetrable city in the world. A young boy would soon be the salvation of this testament to human engineering accomplishment, and it just so happened that a young boy was flying quite single-mindedly towards the great wall of Ba Sing Se. But it was not this child destined for such a thing. Though he was only a few hundred yards from the drill itself, _this_ boy seemed oblivious to its existence. He was staring right at the Avatar with an ever so slightly amused expression, "What do you know, another flyboy," He turned back to the drill, "And this one has a _kite_."

He seemed near the age of the flying child, but had matured to a far greater extent: his chest stuck out and his chin was scraggly with thin hair. The top of his head was no more than peach fuzz as well, dark and nappy, but from the front of his shabby cut cascaded thick, shiny, silver bangs down low over his dark, green eyes; a stark contrast. His body displayed every distinction of an earthbender: dark skin made darker by layers of dirt and dust, bare and blackened feet, and a general roughness around the edges. The rest of his body was hard to distinguish; a long, black cloak was wrapped around his form like a security blanket. He stood with a complete disregard of fear in the face of the metal behemoth, almost in defiance thereof, but even through his obvious bravado radiated a disposition of quiet cynicism. "Worm, you always _have _gone for the 'bigger is better' route," he said to no one in particular, "Whatever you're compensating for – it must be pitiful." The boy took off with a bemused gait towards the first in the line of tanks to the south, which was already changing course and taking aim at the new combatant.

* * *

"General Sung," the guard saluted, "The Avatar is here."

Smiling, the general addressed Aang, "It is an honor to welcome you to the outer wall young Avatar – but your help is not needed.

"Not needed?" repeated Aang.

"_Not _needed," snapped the general, "I have the situation under control. I assure you the Fire Nation cannot penetrate this wall," He rose and purposefully strode to the wall ahead of him. "Many have tried to break through it, but none have succeeded." He stared confidently over the outward side of the wall.

Toph was less than impressed, "What about the Dragon of the West? He got in."

The general seemed startled by this, "Well… uh… technically yes. But he was quickly expunged," regaining his stature, he continued, "Nevertheless, that is why the city is named Ba Sing Se. It's the impenetrable city." A small smile crept up to his lips, "They don't call it Na Sing Se!" He erupted with an obnoxious snorting laugh before elaborating, "_That_ means penetrable city."

Most of the group felt rather embarrassed for him, but again, Toph was unphased, "Yeah, thanks for the tour, but we still got the drill problem."

"Not for long." The general piped, stepping back over to the outward facing side of the wall, "To stop it, I've sent an elite platoon of earthbenders called the Terra Team."

Sokka scratched his chin thoughtfully, "That's a good group name, very catchy."

Aang peered over the wall at the small row of smoking, deformed tanks on one side of the drill. Now it seemed the eight on the other side were being attacked as well, "Well, they seem to be doing a good job from the looks of it. I guess you really _don't_ need our help."

"Of course I don't need your help," touted the general, "there's only one problem… I haven't deployed them yet." The air of the conversation seemed to take an almost physical shift.

"But then who's…?" Sokka muttered. The rest of the group was contemplating the very same thing.

"I'll go check it out." Aang stepped up, opening his glider.

"Wait, Aang." Katara interjected, "Let's all go, we don't know what that thing is. It could be dangerous."

Toph shook her head, "So?"

"_So_, I think we should all go."

Sokka was crossing his arms and looking at the destruction before them, "The fact that we don't know what it is _exactly _why we should send Aang in. We need to figure it out fast or we could be in even more danger." He looked back at his sister, "Aang's the only one fast enough to find out in time. He's our only choice."

"Besides, whatever it _is _obviously doesn't like the Fire Nation – how bad could it be?" Toph offered. Katara still looked timid, "He's the _Avatar_. He'll be fine." Aang looked at her, and she let a small, accepting smile creep up to her lips.

"I'll have my team ready to assist you, Avatar." Aang nodded in confirmation. He started to go, but a voice stopped him.

"Aang," It was Katara. Her hand was curled tightly around her necklace in a worried gesture. She hesitated for a moment more, "… Just be careful." Aang nodded once again. He jumped off the wall and headed for the thrash of destroyed tanks looming in the distance.

From the moment he left the wall, he could feel something wrong in the air, a feeling that he had felt before, at the North Pole… he landed in an eerie stillness. The calm was familiar and unfriendly; mutilated tanks lay strewn about, some separated from their treads, others simply warped beyond recondition, but all smelling of fresh blood and fear. The idea of a Fire Nation _ghost_ was working its way into his mind when, "_How_ did I know we would find _you_ responsible for all this?" He wished it had stayed quiet. Aang turned to his old foe; Mai stood only a few yards away, looking as lethargic as ever.

"Mai!" He shouted. Without a second thought, he launched himself at the girl, ready for anything…

… Except for another familiar face to spring out from behind her. Ty Lee jumped right over Aang and Mai in a single bound. Flipping herself in mid-air, she grasped Aang's ankles, dragging him down to the ground a few feet short of the other girl. Mai closed in, drawing knives from either sleeve, but before she could get there Aang twisted and completed a high kick, sending a blast of air at Ty Lee's chest and righting himself to face his original opponent. Ty Lee dodged the air blast with a quick back flip and lunged right back into the fight. Simultaneously the two girls reached Aang. He jumped straight up, avoiding both attackers. Ty Lee rolled away from Mai's slash, and then focused her attention on the falling Avatar. She bounded up to meet the unsuspecting twelve-year-old, throwing several mid-air blows and quickly rendering his chi, along with most of his muscles, useless.

The two of them fell back to the ground. Ty Lee landed gracefully, but Aang, limp and unprotected, hit the dirt with a mortifying _thud_. "You know Ty Lee, Azula told us we weren't allowed to _kill_ the Avatar," Mai retorted, a wicked grin curling around her lips. "But I'm sure we can still manage something... _entertaining_." Aang squinted his eyes in the glare of light reflecting from the polished blade in Mai's hand. The two girls hovered over the fallen Avatar, Mai wielding her blade in a menacing fashion. Aang was helpless; now no more than a toy to them. It looked as if she would continue her advance, but instead, the smile on her lips dropped, and she raised her hand to her stomach. Ty Lee looked confused; Aang soon saw why. Beneath Mai's hand, the black of her robes was slowly turning a very certain kind of red; one he had only seen a few times, at least like this: it was blood – blood red.

She fell over frontward, dropping her weapon on the ground as her knees gave out from beneath her. For an instant, Aang saw the culprit: a young boy in only stark black pants; his face, neck, right shoulder and right arm were apparently made of steel; with the hand on the rightward appendage fashioned into a crude, bloody spike. There was another distinguishing fact yet: hung from his pants was a holster holding a beautiful knife with a pure white, ivory pommel. In the next instant, he was bowled over and turned the other way by the falling girl. The warm corpse pressed down on him, causing an unfamiliar panic to rise up from somewhere deep in his belly. As he statically attempted to will the lifeless form off of him, he could hear bloodthirsty sounds from behind.

Ty Lee was screaming – a terrible, desperate scream that breathed fear into the heart of the young airbender. It didn't take long – only a minute or so had past before it was all over. The distinct sound of a knife running through fruit clogged the air, only to be washed away by a sloppy blood spatter. Then... all was silent. The silence – it was the loudest silence he had ever heard. He couldn't breath, he couldn't think; nothing seemed to make sense anymore. He could see Monk Gyatso in the distance, calling to him, only to be replaced with the image of a strange boy made of metal...

Someone rolled him over. Just beyond the pair of ruddy, dirty feet, he could see a motionless Ty Lee, collecting dust as the end of her ponytail wavered in the brisk wind. The child kicked Aang again, so that he was looking right at him. The face of steel had been replaced with long, silver bangs that nearly hid his deep, green eyes, and his metal hand as well had returned to a normal shape. He stared at him for a moment, then the boy's mouth opened, "I hope you've enjoyed my little performance, flyboy." The boy smoothed the silver on his face onto the top of his head, revealing his stark, pitiless eyes, "Because you're staring into the eyes of death."

And then – all went black for him as well...

* * *

The boy stared down at the helpless Avatar, "It's never any fun when they pass out like this." He crossed his arms, contemplating his next action, "And if I'm not mistaken, you _are _the Avatar." He scoffed a little to himself, "_Avatar_... no wonder they tried to get _me _doing _your_ job." In the distance, he could see several soldiers approaching on a wave of earth. "I'm too busy to start another war right now, flyboy," He bent down to whisper in his ear, almost as if he would hear him, "Looks like you get to live... today."

With that last sentiment, he turned and strode off in the direction of the drill, which was now getting dangerously close to the wall. With every step, he picked up speed, sprinting after the behemoth as if it were his next meal. With a flick of his wrist, the spike returned; he reared his arm back to strike. The boy jumped at the side of the drill, cutting through the hull like paper on contact. He rolled out of his dive into the sloped bottom of the outer hull, quickly looking around and absorbing his surroundings. "You can never make it easy for me, can you Worm!" he shouted deep into the belly of the drill.

As he looked around, he noticed a door leading to a long corridor a few stories above him. He ran to the pillar closest to the door and dug his spike into the side. "You're not getting away _this_ time."

* * *

"Princess Azula! There's trouble with the tanks!" The guard spoke to the princess' back in the control tower of the drill.

"Yes, I know," Azula replied coldly, "And Mai and Ty Lee have already been sent to take care of it." She turned to the soldier, "I would – _appreciate_ it – if you didn't interrupt me with _old news_." Every inch of her voice was lined with malice; it was everything the poor man could do to keep his knees from shaking.

"Um, but ma'am, you see that's the problem… uh…" he knew what was coming.

"Spit it out, soldier."

"Well… they're dead, ma'am."

A strange expression came over the girls face as a compendium of emotions erupted inside of her, "What?" she choked. Even through her despair, her voice remained icily callous.

Suddenly, the soldier was in a rush to tell her everything, eager to get out of the situation, "They were attacked – uh, it seems there was only one person there, but we couldn't find him. A search party has already been deployed," She was still staring at him with a menacing façade. At a loss for anything else to say, he added, "Um – I'm sorry for your loss… your highness." Azula screamed, spinning around and firing a large ball of hot, blue fire into the bewildered soldier's chest. He was knocked back, nearly hitting another, higher ranking officer on the way down.

It seemed he was just as reluctant to tell her his news as his predecessor. "Princess, there's been a breech in the hull! Something's inside," Azula seemed very interested by this statement. "We've already sent a squad down to intercept it."

There was a nearly unnoticeable pause, a fleeting moment of deliberation, and, "Tell them to hold their positions."

"Wha – what?"

"I don't remember stuttering, _soldier_." The man couldn't even manage to bark out a _Yes, ma'am._ "They'll stay put for ten minutes, then report to my location." The princess stalked off past her subordinate, "This one's _mine_."

* * *

The boy heaved himself over the brace and stood up, panting slightly. He looked at the door – empty. He took a moment to steady himself on the side of the vertical brace, but a cold voice like lightning bolt in a dark night sky split the air in two, "I've got five good minutes with you before they come to scoop up your _corpse_… or at least what's left of it." In the sheer iciness of the statement, he could almost see his own breath, though he didn't seem to notice.

"I'm getting tired of these distractions." He turned to face his adversary, wielding his spike threateningly, "So why don't you do us _both_ a favor and fall over dead right now?" The princess moved into her stance for lightning, sending crackling sparks of electricity all over her body. The bolt shot forward, catching her adversary completely off guard and sending him careening to the floor with a terrifying scream and a deafening crack.

He lay on the floor panting and twitching for seconds after the flash had dissipated. "Don't like lightning do you?" She seemed to be toying with him, a cat with a mouse in its paw – but this mouse was resilient. With a heavy grunt, the armor-clad warrior sprang to his feet, holding his spike at the ready and executing a series of quick jabs at the princess. She dodged with practiced precision, and soon she was on the offensive, every fire assisted punch pushing her adversary closer to the steel barrier behind them. His back touched the pillar; Azula pinned his arms across his chest, leaving him in a very vulnerable position. The boy threw his head up with a grunt, causing the silvery tendrils on his forehead to melt over his face. In almost the same motion, he brought his head down, slamming his armored skull into Azula's unprotected nose.

As she stumbled back, the boy retracted his spike and, with a slightly more deliberate move, replaced it with a large double-sided blade. He swung at her furiously, the end of his weapon even displacing the loose hairs in front of her face. There was no time to draw her lightning stance; she blasted an enormous gust of blue fire straight into the steel beneath their feet, swallowing the immediate area in a black cloud. There was no movement from the interior of the smoke cloud, and for a second, Azula wondered if she had somehow won. The thought left her quickly, however, when she heard several mysterious clanking noises from somewhere inside the black to her front.

She hastily went through the motions to create her lightning, blasting it directly into the smoke. She heard nothing for the longest time. Soon, the cloud all but disappeared, but what was left behind mystified her: the metallic likeness of a young boy's head, right shoulder, and right arm. She realized what was going on a second too late.

"Peek-aboo…" He was too quick for her to react; a sold knuckle cracked against the back of her head, sending her reeling. She landed at an odd angle on the unoccupied armor, but even as she lay on top of it, she could feel it slowly moving from beneath her – he was calling it too him. She knew she didn't stand a chance against him with his armor, so she would have to think quickly. She got a hold of it around the shoulder and heaved it over the boundaries of the steel beam. "No!" shouted the now unprotected boy. He ran to the edge, thrusting his hand downward; for a moment, the suit hung in mid air. Azula kicked at him, sending a fire blast his direction. He rolled to avoid the flames, but in doing so, his precious metal slipped out of reach. It was all or nothing now for both combatants.

Azula was still wary, however, of the knife at his side, though he didn't seem to even be _aware_ of it. She spun around with a large, sweeping kick, sending waves of fire at the boy's feet. With astounding speed, he flung himself upward, cart wheeling over the girl. As he landed, he threw his hands on the steel beneath his feet. With an enormous screech, a section of the beam contorted, launching Azula a few feet off the ground. The boy jumped at her, planting both of his feet on her chast and sending her flying back towards where she had come in. With a gruesome _crack_, her head smashed into the frame of the doorway, knocking her out cold. The boy heaved a sigh of relief and fell back on to the floor.

In too short of an order, he had been electrocuted, burned, beaten, and finally stripped of his most prized possession – his armor. Still, he knew there would be a squad of soldiers through there in no time, so he groaned to his feet. He walked tentatively towards Azula; half of him expected her to be dead, and the other half hoped for it. He bent down to examine her: the back of her head was coated in a sticky red mess, but it did not seem to have broken through her skull. She groaned a little when the stranger rolled her over; she would not be out for long. He looked around for a quick way to finish with his problem.

Grabbing her up by the collar, he drew her out at arms length over the edge of the steel brace. It was a strange sight, as the princess was both older and taller than her captive. She cracked her eyes, her vision hazy and her mind numb. He couldn't help but crack another smile, "No, I don't like lightning."

He let go.

He stood over the chasm a few moments longer, tired and relieved. He thought he could hear her hit the floor below… no, it was too loud for that. And it didn't come from down there. The boy righted himself and turned to the doorway – where four fully armed soldiers were standing. "You're under arrest!" One of them called, "show us your hands and come along quietly!"

The boy looked at the soldiers with a mild expression. Quietly, he shuffled over to the group, displaying his hands for all to see. Then, just as the guard grabbed him by the arm to take him in, the boy pulled back with all his might, swinging the shocked guard into a chokehold, "You've just made two mistakes: One. You both harbored _and_ trusted a traitorous prick like Worm. And two," He rotated around on one heel and threw the man over the edge of the brace. His scream could be heard all the way down. "You got _anywhere_ near _me_."

* * *

A/N: The guy has a name, you'll just have to keep reading to find out what it is. And I didn't just kill off two main characters because I don't like them, and you did just hear me say _two_, I killed them for a specific purpose. And sorry if this moved kind of fast, otherwise, I would have had to spend a good ten chapters explaining the whole beginning. The next two or so will probably be the same way, but like I said before, after that, it gets a lot better.

A/N: Also, I'm looking for a good beta -- if you're interested, send me a PM (that's _PM_)


End file.
